When to Stay and When to Go

“The Dip” is a book by Seth Godin that touts itself as “A little book that teaches you when to quit (and when to stick).” So what exactly does this mean, and what does it have to do with prepping? Well, the main idea of the book is that every new project or major change starts out fun and interesting, but as time goes on, these once fun activities can become difficult, boring, and downright irritating. This is why so many of us have half-finished projects at home, half-read books, and emails that we know we’ll get back to.

The trick, as taught by the book is to know if you’re in a dip, which is a temporary setback, or if you’re just heading down hill with no end in sight. If you’re in a dip then you have to work twice as hard to get out of it and get back on track while if you’re in a free-fall you should cut your losses and move on. While this idea is applied to business in the book, it applies to the art of survival and prepping very nicely, too.

What happens when you reach a point of prepping that you don’t feel you’re adding any more value even though you’re dumping money into your prep? Well, you can keep going and purchasing items and learning skills, or you can decide you’re heading down a dead-end path and drop it for something different. By “dropping it” we mean choosing a different scenario to follow and prep for that may fit your lifestyle better and offer a wider range of fallback. (continue reading)